On Account of Darkness: Shining Light on Race and Sport

On Account of Darkness offers a rich historical account of racial relations in connection to sport in and around Chatham-Kent, a sparsely populated farming community located three hours southwest of Toronto. The urban center of the community is Chatham, “sandwiched” between the Indigenous communities of Delaware and Walpole Island First Nations and “home to Dresden and Buxton, two important terminals on the underground railroad” (1). Kennedy himself was born and raised there, witnessing firsthand the generational legacy of Canada's traumatic past while juxtaposing this with “the multicultural discourse of equity, inclusion, and pluralism” (2) that most Canadians prefer. The his/herstories he tells in the course of twenty-one chapters are based primarily on first- and second-hand experiences and recollections by members of the Indigenous, Black, and Japanese communities. They provide powerful narratives about racial oppression in Southern Ontario and a call for continued efforts to eradicate systemic racial and gender-based injustice.Kennedy draws upon numerous sports throughout the book and repeatedly refers to the historical importance of baseball within the Black community. Black baseball teams were formally organized in Chatham in 1871, and in 1934, a historically important team called the Chatham Coloured All-Stars finally gained entry into the provincial championships. White or Black, no Chatham team had ever won a provincial championship, and their successes momentarily united the town. In a pinnacle moment highlighting racial tensions of the time, the All-Stars were up 3–2 and one out away from winning the championship. However, the umpires had other ideas and called the game “on account of darkness,” moving the score back to 2–2 and hurriedly leaving the field. Years later, one of the player's sons reflected, “Why'd they call the game on account of darkness? Well, it was dark because there were nine Black players out there, that's why it was too dark” (56).When the Canadian government invoked the War Measures Act in 1942, large numbers of Japanese Canadians were forced to live under harsh conditions in internment camps. For those that were dispersed to Chatham-Kent, the local government and citizens “did not want Japanese Canadians infiltrating their communities, not as internees and definitely not as residents” (78). Kennedy devotes several chapters to highlighting the importance of baseball in internment camps and the accomplishments of several notable Japanese Canadian athletes. For instance, Satoshi “Joe” Izumi was interned in Eatonville during the war and went on to become one of the most celebrated sport fishers in Canada. The brothers George, Bill, and Albert Chin from Lucknow quickly became noticed for their superb hockey skills, though they were never offered entry into the National Hockey League. Mel and Herb Wakabayashi from Chatham's East End became noted hockey players in the area in the 1960s and sports stars in Japan after their participation in the 1972 Olympic Games there.Throughout the book, Kennedy is candid about his own racial ignorance, especially regarding the Indigenous population. However, for him, it was sports that helped the unknown become known and unveiled many of the horrors the Indigenous communities have endured. He learned of broken treaties, residential schools, blood quantum, forced separation of families, and sundown laws. Yet it was the relationships he formed with Indigenous teammates that changed the trajectory of his life and the way he would ultimately relate with people different from himself. Through his teammates, he would learn about Tom Longboat, a Six Nations long-distance runner who won the Boston Marathon in 1908. He learned of Elijah Pinnance, who is considered the first Indigenous Major League Baseball player, spending three seasons with the Cleveland Spiders. He would also learn why the hockey arena on the Six Nations reserve was named after an Indigenous lacrosse icon named Gaylord Powless. Over time and drawing upon his reconciliation with his own struggles, he demonstrates how progress can be made on an individual level.Several stories of Black, Indigenous, and Japanese women are present in the book, although they take up much less space and are more fragmented than many of the narratives about men, which reflects the body of historiography on women and sports in general. Kennedy addresses challenges of minority women created by the intersections of gender and race and provides accounts of several notable sporting women and pioneering women's teams: the Buxton Bloomers all-Black fastball team in 1926; Eva Shipman and Ida Simpson racing their Ojibwe ponies in the 1920s; Delores Shadd, the Red Dragon basketball coach fighting for women's rights and those of the Black community in the 1940s; the Florence Chicks championship-winning fastball team in the 1950s; Indigenous baseball and hockey players Shirley and Gwen Huff in the 1960s; and some younger generation athletes, including Black Indigenous rugby player Breanne Nicholas, Japanese-Canadian hockey legend Vicky Sunohara, Black hockey player Angela James, golfer Sheryl Tooshkenig, and hunter Alyssa Sands.

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